Armor
by streco
Summary: A vengeful murderer is doing so much more than just killing people, and he won't stop until he successfully chips away Stella's armor. And when he finally does, Mac is the only one who can reconstruct it.
1. Prologue: The Color Red

Armor

* * *

This hit me randomly. This is a big potato lead, btws, therefore it starts halfway through the story as a lead. The whole story will be in third person, this is just like a prologue in Stella's eyes.

* * *

_And suddenly, you're deep enough  
To lay your armor down._  
Dashboard Confessional, "Don't Wait"

* * *

"I want the girl cop," he'd said in vain. "The tall one. Curly hair. Send her, alone, or I press the detonator."

We'd tested him once before. He'd asked the same request—me—and when we'd told him to go ahead, "press the detonator," he had. In the blink of an eye, he'd blown up a building full of innocent people, and it was my fault.

Mac had claimed it was his. He'd been the one to forbid me from going, keeping me busy at the building. When the NYPD had challenged him to "just do it," I watched from my office window as an apartment complex exploded into fire.

The imagine burned behind my eyelids now as I secured my gun in its holster. It had almost been to easy. I'd told Mac I hadn't felt well all day, even going as far as to purposely retch my own lunch, and he'd told me to go home. Now I was standing where he'd wanted me before, my vest over my sweatshirt. My curls were heavy with rain and weighing me down, but I pressed forward anyway.

The door to the building was made of steel, and it took a lot of struggle and muscle to pry it open. It slipped from my hands a few times, and when I finally forced it ajar, I slid in and a voice instantly demanded that I shut and lock it again.

When I didn't lock the door, a shotgun cocked.

That was when I deduced I was both dealing with some serious shit and dangerously in a lot of it.

Aiming my Glock ahead of me, I locked the door and started moving forward. The darkness was almost painful and extremely disorienting—it was a challenge to remember where forward and backward were.

After a long, long time of walking, there was a slam from somewhere behind me. Another door.

"There you are," cooed a threatening voice, "so nice to see you, _Stella_."

My gun shook violently in my hands. The voice was familiar, _so _familiar, but how so was making me draw a blank. The first thing that hit my head was the color red—a brilliant scarlet, the color of anger. Blood. Remorse.

"Let me guess... you can't remember?"

And then I did.

The clattering of the gun hitting the ground hit my ears before the memory stung my retinas. My heart rate tripled its pace as my entire body began to tingle with an agonizing sense of dread.

Frankie's brother. The sex offender, the murderer. Frankie had said his fraternal twin had gotten the bad genes, and though I'd strongly debated the truth of that statement before, I now was leaning toward the other direction again.

"Jesse," I exhaled.

The only encounter I'd had with Jesse had been scarring on its own. Frankie had gone to get pizza. Jesse had smashed a wine glass and come at me with it, the jagged end nearly gracing my neck, demanding that I get naked or he'd see to it himself one day. Frankie had come back, claiming his brother was mentally unwell (as he always had), so I thought nothing of it.

Oh, _God_.

"So you _do _remember," he chuckled. "I thought you would. You're a bright one."

"Jesse," I whispered, trying to keep my breathing steady, "Jesse, listen to me. You don't—"

His hands were on my neck then, hungry boa constrictors squeezing so hard I could almost feel them molding to my trachea. "Don't try that bullshit with me," he suggested in a syrupy voice. "I'm the one with the bomb. And the shotgun... and the cell phone," he added as an afterthought, pulling mine from my pocket.

He eased his vicegrip on my windpipe and I fell to the ground, tasting the oxygen greedily. He pushed my face into the rocks and I felt my nose scream from the pressure. He sat on my back as he dialed.

"She's dead, you know. If you want the body, try her apartment."

Without even asking, I knew he'd called Mac.

He hung up and threw the phone into the empty darkness, and I felt my hope shatter along with it. Brilliant red flooded my vision.

When he stood, air once again inflated my lungs. He mindlessly picked up something else and smashed it—my gun, I assumed.

"Do you know how I felt when you killed Frankie?" he asked casually. "I bet you have no idea what it's like to lose the most important person to you. Too bad you won't feel that today... but at least Detective Taylor will."

My brain flew into overdrive, my heart threatened to pop out of my chest. This had happened so quickly. I should've listened to Mac. He was always right. He knew something like this would happen, but I had assumed it wouldn't.

"But first!" he exclaimed. "There is work to be done."

He dragged me to my feet and punched me hard once in the jaw and once to the stomach. When I doubled over, he kicked my knee—something shattered—and then dislocated my shoulder. All at once. My ability to fight back was limited; no matter how hard I kicked or pushed or screamed the only response was an echo and another blow.

Defeated, my body finally collapsed beneath his fists and sprawled onto the cavelike floor. He removed my clothes violently, leaving me in nothing but a practical pink sports bra. And as he did what he promised so many years ago, I bit my lip and didn't cry. Satisfaction was not his to have. Instead I focused on the pain, so abundant in every cell of my body; and Mac, how easily he'd figure out the fluke tip.

When Jesse was finished, he heaved me to my feet and pushed me against one of the stone walls. My head jarred and my balance gave. I greeted the floor once again. A light sheet drifted atop my back.

"Hope Taylor finds you, Stella," he snickered. "Thanks again."

He pressed a button somewhere off in the distance, and a steady, light beeping began. A countdown. I forced my eyes up, thick with tears and blood, and felt my veins turn cold at the digital _10:00 _that clicked down at much too quick of a pace.

Ten minutes. Ten minutes to get myself out of this room, or I would die.

The color red was blurring the edges of my eyes again—not from the blood or the tears, but from the rage. From the agony. From the bittersweet hope that maybe I would die in here instead of force the others to see me like this.

My selfishness made me sick, and I turned and vomited.

Giving up was not an option, however.

As best I could, I dug my fingernails into the rock, inching myself closer to the long hall on my stomach. I promised myself that that was as far as I needed to go, then I would allow myself to sleep.

When I reached for the latch upon finally making it to the door, my limbs screamed in an angered protest. With much difficulty, I forced the door open.

Time passed in slow motion then.

I crawled out the door and pulled the sheet tiredly over my body again. That was when sleep came like a wool blanket, and Mac's face came like an angelic omen.

And in the final moments of consciousness, red took over my sight. An explosive red, a loud red, a painful red. _He'll find me_, it promised. _He always does_.


	2. Colors

_I need you like a heart needs a beat,  
But it's nothing new._  
OneRepublic, "Apologize"

* * *

Only a few things were keeping Mac from ramming his head into the wall.

One was, and always would be, Stella. She managed to find her way in one way or another into every list he wrote about virtually anything. Earlier, she'd gotten the flu or something related to it, which was absolutely unheard of. There were two people Mac knew who never, ever got sick: Stella and himself. It was one of the many freakish things they had in common.

Another was his own determination and fierce hunger for justice—the very thought of a killer, a bomber, somewhere in his city made his blood sing with fury. The last was the ever-changing variable that is "the unknown." What building would be blown up this time? How many would die? When the apartment complex had exploded, the terrifying, unnerving realization that someone had just lost their very own Claire hit him like a freight train.

He didn't want to answer his phone when it rang, but of course he did anyway. Not only was he the head of the CSI department in the city that never slept, but he was Mac Taylor. He was, in theory, the cat that curiosity killed.

"Taylor," he answered, an aggravated undertone seasoning his voice. The annoying ring tone silenced and the person on the other end didn't wait to speak.

"She's dead, you know. If you want the body, try her apartment."

Mac froze.

Sheldon suddenly fled into the room, anxiety dripping from his skin. "We've got activity at Stella's apartment. I've already—"

Mac's throat was aflame, his stomach churning and flipping on its axis. "Get EMS on the way. Cops, bomb squad—everyone." As he walked quickly from his desk, a picture frame teetered and then fell over, glass smashing in every direction.

He didn't have to turn to know it'd been a picture of Stella and himself.

If he could've stopped to pick it up or even acknowledge it as some sort of an omen he would have—Mac Taylor had always, always been a man of superstition, though he'd deny it even if his life depended on it—but there was no time, only breaths and complications, and moments to live.

It had probably been thirty seconds of driving (of which he couldn't remember) when he realized Sheldon was screaming, demanding that he pull the car over. Mac subconsciously drove on, his foot ramming the gas pedal through the floor. He wasn't sure where he was going, or how fast he was going, but even for an emergency, it was an unhealthy pace.

"_Mac!_"

That was when his foot eased off the gas pedal, so slowly that it was almost unnoticeable. The car was steered toward the side of the road and came to a stop. Mac looked idly out the window for a split second and then threw the door open, stepping into high speed oncoming traffic.

Sheldon pulled him out of the way and shoved him into the passenger seat, walking around to the drivers side and hurrying in. He started Mac's truck again without a word and drove at a quick but safe pace, without so many hairpin turns and violent sways at unknown times.

Mac's fists were clenching tighter and tighter until he realized he'd dug his nails into his own palms, drawing blood.

The car screamed up to Stella's house and Mac nearly flew out of the still-moving vehicle. Sheldon didn't even turn the car off.

When he ran to the door, Flack was already disappearing from it. "Nothing here."

"I was just on the phone with the guy, he said there'd be a body," Mac rambled hurriedly. "If there isn't one, then he has to be somewhere... I don't know where he could be... I don't _know_," he repeated. The words blubbered from his lips uselessly. "There has to be something... some sort of evidence, something... anything."

Through space his mind flew—back in time, to the evidence, to the beginning of the case. Anything. An address. A location. A time. _Anything_.

When his mind found it, he was running. Sprinting. The truck was there, metal beneath his hands, leather in his bloody palms, his phone already tittering at his side. He picked it up and spoke into it, his voice tense, a great dam holding back the screams that wanted to break through.

"The warehouse he'd wanted us in before," he barked. "At the other end of town."

He didn't even close the phone—simply dropped it into the passenger seat as Flack roared into it. The radio was on, an alert ripping through it at a high frequency, one of his coworkers' voice frightening the city into horrified oblivion and uselessness.

Once again his phone rang, but this time, he didn't pick it up. Five minutes ago, curiosity could've killed him. But now, curiosity meant nothing.

All he could see was Stella.

"Attention!" the radio screeched, "2344 Lexington Avenue, there has been..."

Stella. That was Stella's address. Mac growled viciously, the sound reverberating. and punched the radio off. He reached blindly for his phone. Flack. Flack. Which speed dial was he?

In the dark, somewhere in the back of his mind, Mac registered the feeling of his seams ripping and falling apart, his world crumbling to dust in a moment's notice.

The phone rang half a time and then the man picked up. "_Mac, Stella's place just went up in flames_," Flack shouted over the craziness, his voice tight with emotion. "_I'm on my way as fast as I can with Danny and Lindsay, Hawkes is already halfway there. Hang in tight. Do not go in without backup, do __you hear me? We're dealing with serious shit, and..._"he trailed off with concerned words and deep thoughts, but Mac's brain couldn't process the anything—he understood Flack's words but couldn't match them with reality.

The warehouse was there, then, before his eyes, an image branded into his memory forever. When he reached the door—heavy, steel, and locked, he didn't know what to do.

"_Open the door!_" he shouted, pounding on it with his bloody hands, his voice shaking with each syllable omitted from his lips. "_NYPD, open up, NOW!_"

Nothing. At all.

Seconds. Minutes. They passed like molasses, and when backup finally arrived, it had been raining for some time.

But when the backup arrived, that was when the bomb went off.

Mac, leaning his head against the steel door, heard the dull, familiar noise loud and clear, and began to pound on the wall in front of him. And then it was open—Flack and another man had forced it open with something he didn't wait to keep track off—and Mac burst through, his gun drawn but not cocked, his heart angry but broken, more than anything else. The blast had hardly reached this room; it seemed to have come from the room at the far end of the hall, judging by his flashlight and thethere fire crackling . But most of the ceiling had caved in and fallen like rubble.

"_STELLA!_"

His own voice echoed back at him mercilessly. The fire snapped angrily. "Stella," he repeated over and over. "Stella, Stella, Stella."

The back up seeped in and took over, searching quickly but thoroughly. Mac began forcing large pieces of ceiling from the floor, uncovering nothing each time, his heart continuing to tear into millions of shards that stabbed him relentlessly from the insides.

"We've got something!" Danny shouted, a hand over his mouth as he coughed. Torn and tattered fabric dangled from his hands, and oh, shit, it was her shirt, ripped down the middle, bloody, dusty.

But not burnt.

She wasn't dead.

Stella _couldn't_ die.

"Stella," he whispered now, but more to himself than anything. "Stella. Stella. Stella, Stella, Stella." It ran together in his mind, one syllable, one thought. One necessity. One thing he wasn't leaving this fucking cave without. _Stellastellastellastellastellastella._

And then he saw it.

A flick of pale green fabric—a pleasant contrast to the gruesome surroundings. The tip of his flashlight caught it and he dropped to the ground, scooting as fast as he could, tearing his pants and his skin on the knees. Pushing rubble aside, he discovered her. Bleeding, dirty, unconscious.

"_I found her!_" he forced out, and grabbed her wrist. A pulse. All he needed was a pulse to keep his own going.

_Thump._

A pause.

_Thump._

_Thump_.

And in that instant she was in his arms, and he was careful not to jar her. Her body was exposed except for the sheet. Bruised. Beaten. Abused.

The rest was a blur. Outside. The rain. The ambulance. The place was the same as long as she was there. None of it mattered, unless she was there.

"Stella," his voice broke then and a single tear fell down his face. That was it. A single tear from his face, her name again and again from his throat. "Stella, oh, God. Stella. Stella. _Please_."

When they reached the hospital, he couldn't follow her to surgery. This confused him in his battered state. Flack tried to explain, but Mac repeated her name, tried to bargain his way in. Flack gently pushed him into a chair, too hard for his back, without armchairs.

"Please," Mac repeated. "Please, I have to make sure she's okay—I'm the boss of this department! She's my parter; no, I'm not family, but I'm her partner—I'm all she has!"

A nurse walked away quickly as Mac repeated his statement uselessly in the crisp, unnatural air. "I'm her partner! _I'm the only person she has!_"

A hand was on his shoulder. He turned his head. Flack.

There was silence. Mac's face contorted into misery. "She's all _I _have," he whispered in torment, and then dropped his head into his hands.

A sob rang out then, one so full of pain and despair that the color in Flack's world instantly evaporated. A monochrome remained; an outline, an unreal replacement for reality. Mac Taylor was crying. The toughest man he'd ever met was crying because the toughest woman he'd ever met had almost been killed. And almost was dead.

Mac needed Stella more than he needed oxygen, as far as Flack was concerned. She'd always held him together, and now, without her, he was falling apart.

Lindsay's breakdown instantly followed. Danny's arms found hers and he embraced her, pressing her body as close as possible to his. Sheldon took a step closer to Mac and laid a hand comfortingly on his back as Flack fell to his knees and wrapped his arms around his boss. "She's okay, Mac," Flack whispered, his voice aquiver with terror. "She's okay, she's alive."

But the only response was Mac's empty choking heart, grasping at the air, unable to get enough of it.

* * *

Just an fyi – the song at the beginning is SO much better WITHOUT timbaland in it. OneRepublic is awesome.

Sorry this sucks :( Don't worry, it'll get better. When I'm done with this story, I'm writing a prequel to it. Originally, I was going to start at the very beginning (a very good place to start) after the prologue, but I wasn't feelin it.


	3. Hands

_The smell of death is in the air;  
A woman weeping in despair says,  
He has been here.

* * *

_

The first thing to come back after her consciousness was the pain immediately followed by the cloudy, vague memories, and only then the desire to open her eyes and face the man she was sure was holding her hand.

Her brain was working, being its regular sarcastic, intelligent self when all she wanted to do was seem moderately pleasant or attentive. At least one of her ribs had cracked and possibly collapsed, judging by the sharp pain she felt each time she breathed in. Her right ankle was badly sprained. A throbbing headache pounded at her skull and various patches of her skin seemed to have their own pulse as well.

Someone's soft thumb was rubbing her fingers tenderly, and she didn't need sight to know it was Mac. She was fairly positive he knew she was awake, too. Suspicions were confirmed when he began to speak.

"Broken rib, along with a collapse," he murmured quietly, his voice throwing a violent shade of pain behind her eyelids. The sound stabbed at her already pounding head. "A piece of ceiling managed to cause enough blunt trauma to do that and also possibly cause a concussion. A sprained right ankle, multiple bruises. Light burns on legs." His voice ached with ire.

There was a pause, and then a loud, shaky inhalation. "One large gash on the left side of your lower abdomen, other various scrapes and cuts." He stopped. "But you already knew all that, didn't you?"

A minuscule smile quirked to her lips, but then it was gone. Her eyes opened and immediately shut with a pained groan.

His hand was gone immediately and then the lights were off, only the fish tank light in the hall setting off a comfortable blue glow. With the light went a high-pitched buzzing, leaving just the pouring rain outside and her own breathing tangled with Mac's.

Her eyes opened again. "Better?" he asked, a tight smile appearing across his features. If she could've without disturbing her brain, she would've nodded, but decided against it.

He helped her sit up gingerly in the bed. "You're not going anywhere for a little while, so don't try anything creative," he told her. "You've been through hell. It's a wonder you're even alive, Stella."

The look he gave her frightened her. Like it really was a wonder she was alive.

"I'm trying to... to remember," she supplied, cringing into the darkness.

"I wish you didn't have to," Mac sighed. "You've only been out for a few hours. They relocated your knee and shoulder. Lindsay and Hawkes are processing the scene now; we haven't found anything we could possibly get anyone on, except the gun."

It was clear it was difficult for him to be so nonchalant about this—his jaw was locked in place angrily and his features were screwed up in restraint from showing his real emotions.

"The gun?" Stella asked, eyes wide. Tears filled them. She angled her head upward to try to drain them out. "I don't remember, Mac, I can't..."

She remembered the pain, the threatening tone to his voice. Seeing red. The awful feeling of realization that had hit her like a fucking mack truck when she'd discovered who he was hit her once again, and her emotions painted her face with anguish.

Mac's hands encompassed hers, squeezing tightly. He held her comfortingly in his gaze, though the rest of his face now looked just as tormented as hers.

"Jesse," she breathed, her chest heaving up and down as she tried to control her thoughts. "Jesse Mala, he was... he was Frankie's brother."

Mac's fists almost crushed Stella's fragile fingers.

It always went back to Frankie. Always. Mac lit up with fury at the sound of his name.

"Stella, you don't have to do this now," he whispered as consolingly as he could through his clenched teeth. "You need rest."

But then she was sobbing harder than he'd ever seen her do so before, and he had to hug her, no matter how afraid he was of shattering her anymore. She didn't move, only weeped harder, soaking his shirt in a matter of moments.

And that was how they remained for quite a while. From behind him, Danny came in and uttered half a syllable before turning and retreating, knowing it wasn't his place to interfere. Flack came in after that, and he stayed until she finally quieted down and began her story, her breaths hiccuping painfully in her chest.

"Mac, I had to solve this, I had to do it. You couldn't keep me from working just because he wanted me, you can't protect me all the time. I had to do it. I couldn't kill more people again. All those people, dead, because of me. I can't take that. And all I remember... it was Jesse. It was him, Mac; he said he was angry because I killed his brother, because I killed Frankie—and he said that you would get to feel what it was like to lose someone important..." she trailed off and began to cry again.

Flack seemed to stop breathing in the background. "Frankie's _brother?_" he roared, throwing the newspaper he'd had in his hands to the ground. "Son of a bitch!" he shouted, and turned and exited the room in a near sprint.

"It's okay, Stella. It's okay," he repeated over and over into her hair, trying as hard as he could to make the words true.

"That's all I remember, Mac," she finished, her crying coming to a close.

"Don't worry," he said, releasing her awkwardly and sitting normally in the chair. "Just like last time, the evidence will fill in the empty spaces. We _will _catch this guy, okay? He's not going to get away with this."

The hardness of his voice was comforting to Stella. Mac always made her feel safe, especially when she was too vulnerable to protect herself. Though she did hate that feeling more than anything else, except maybe the entire Mala family tree at this point.

"Flack will be talking to you," he said, slowly rising to his feet. Stella nodded, understanding why Mac wouldn't. Though she'd be more comfortable with him, he couldn't take reliving it again, and he would do everything in his power to catch Jesse.

"After the nurse processes you," he added softly, and Stella nodded.

"Thank you, Mac."

Mac smiled a tight smile and took her hand again into his, the one intimate thing Mac Taylor would ever let himself do. Though he'd seen many years in the service, building bombs and firing rifles and protecting the United States, his hands remained uncalloused and soft, the only innocent part of him.

"Hang in there, Stella."

She smiled back. "What other choice do I have?"

* * *

short, uneventful, WHATEVARRR

**songcred; **He Has Been Here, James Blunt


End file.
